Floyd held Roxiana’s hand as they walked.

Roxiana looked around, pressing down her hat that seemed about to fly away in the wind with her right hand not held by him. The narrow alley where the two were walking was rarely frequented by people, and it was dimly lit without the sparkling magic stones.

Roxiana was worried that an assassin might jump out from the darkness that existed between each building. However, Floyd, who had been targeted by the assassin’s sword, showed no sign of vigilance.

‘Is he that confident? Or is he just naturally fearless?’

Either way, his attitude, unbecoming of someone who had nearly been ambushed just moments ago, was surprising.

After exiting the alley, they arrived at the seaside. Not a harbor, but a seaside with a wide stretch of sandy beach. At the edge of the quite expansive beach, there was a cliff that seemed to have been cut vertically.

Roxiana stared at the night sea for a moment, lost in thought.

The moon illuminating the pitch-black darkness created a long path of moonlight on the sea. The sight of the long light swaying on the undulating waves was fantastic.

Whoosh―

The rhythmic sound was refreshing. The scent of the sea, stronger than what she had smelled at Lily Palace, evoked a strange sense of nostalgia. Although it was her first time seeing the sea properly like this, it felt as if she had been here long ago.

She didn’t even realize her hat had flown away in the strong wind.

Only after Floyd retrieved the flying hat and put it back on her did Roxiana take her eyes off the dark sea and look up at him.

“It’s beautiful.”

“Yes, it is. It’s a place I love.”

He took off his coat and spread it wide on the sand. Then he sat down beside it and patted the coat.

“Sit here.”

“Thank you.”

Roxiana carefully sat on the coat and hugged her legs with both arms. The two sat side by side, silently gazing at the sea for a while.

Roxiana was the first to speak.

“Does that happen often?”

“Once every few months. Sometimes three or four times a month.”

“That often…”

Since there had never been any attempts at ambush against the Franche royal family, it was surprising to learn that the monarch of a country suffered from assassination threats so frequently.

“There are quite a few who are seething because a young man with special abilities won’t bow his head. Or there are those who want to kill me and take over Torkan. For example.”

Floyd turned to look at Roxiana.

“Like the crown prince of Gania.”

At first, Roxiana didn’t immediately understand who he meant by ‘the crown prince of Gania’. The moment she turned her head and met his eyes, feeling his gaze, she realized he was talking about the man she had almost married.

“Prince Pelur…?”

“Yes, that son of a… Excuse me. That bad… That bastard.”

Roxiana knew that Lucas disliked Floyd. Lucas often cursed Floyd as ‘a man who doesn’t know his place or gratitude’ for leaving Gania and seizing a country with his own power.

But she never dreamed that he would actually send assassins to kill him. No matter how displeased he was, they were still brothers with the same father.

Misunderstanding Roxiana’s silence, Floyd said,

“I didn’t want to speak ill of the princess’s former fiancé, I’m sorry.”

Former fiancé.

Right, they had been engaged once.

Roxiana could vividly recall Lucas’s face after a long time.

Brilliant golden hair, almond-shaped long eyes with deep blue pupils, a fine jawline and pale skin, a straight nose and red lips.

That neat and handsome appearance that could make women’s hearts flutter, not because he was a crown prince, but simply for his face alone.

And then.

―”I’ve always been disgusted and unable to stand that side of you.”

―”Open it and show me. The princess should know what happened to her family too.”

Their last meeting, his voice then, his expression, his gaze, his movements, each came back clearly, constricting her heart. The wound she had barely managed to close reopened, gushing blood.

Floyd didn’t notice Roxiana holding her breath to keep from wailing.

“But you should know this too. That’s just the kind of person he is. It’s just a piece of trash doing trashy things. That’s what happened in Kanta.”

“…”

“It’s not your fault, princess, nor anyone else’s in the Franche royal family. It’s just that that bastard is trash.”

Roxiana lowered her gaze.

It was difficult to look directly at Floyd as she tried to contain her pain.

Lucas, and Elise. She didn’t want to hate those two. Not because she wanted to forgive them, but because she just wanted to erase their very existence from her mind.

She wanted to think only about the sorrow of losing her family and the way to save them. She didn’t want to be swayed by any other thoughts or emotions.

―”If you hate, you lose, Roxy.”

Was it when she was 15? There was a time when she was very angry because of some marquis’s daughter. When she was fuming all night, her second older brother, Ian, said with a grin,

―”She’s probably sound asleep by now, not thinking about you at all. If you’re the only one so angry that you can’t sleep, you’re the only one losing out. So just forget about it. That’s how you win.”

The conversation she had with Ian then became a huge center in Roxiana’s life. Roxiana tried not to hold onto hatred for someone for a long time, even if she got into fights or arguments with them.

Because that’s how you win. Because she believed that was victory.

‘Is it true, brother? Even in this situation, is not thinking about them how I win?’

Roxiana wanted to ask Ian.

‘Even if Lucas and Elise killed all our family members, threw them in the well, is forgetting everything and living my life how I win? Is that the path to my victory?’

Of course, Ian’s answer didn’t come.

Instead, Floyd’s voice was heard.

“I sent people to Kanta, and they reported back.”

Roxiana turned her head to look at Floyd.

“They say a rift has appeared. Monsters are flowing out, causing great damage. Because of that, they couldn’t even enter the capital.”

“Monsters…”

Roxiana squeezed her eyes shut.

Her heart ached thinking of the citizens suffering because of the monsters. Since dealing with monsters was difficult, Gania was unlikely to send extermination teams to help actively.

‘And I… can’t do anything either. Despite surviving.’

Towards Roxiana who had fallen into despair, Floyd spoke calmly.

“Gania won’t just stand by and watch. They won’t let Kanta, which they’ve struggled to get their hands on, truly perish.”

“Do you really think so?”

“Yes. They did this because they wanted Kanta’s resources, but if everything gets contaminated by magic, all their efforts will have been for nothing. To prevent that, they’ll request support from the Empire and exterminate the monsters.”

“And the Kanta knights who survived will be deployed for extermination. The knights who were loyal to the Franche royal family will fight to the death to protect Kanta, while those with shallow loyalty will survive by being cautious.”

Roxiana sighed.

“And Gania will take in those surviving knights.”

Floyd was a little surprised by Roxiana’s foresight. Floyd had been thinking the same thing.

It wasn’t easy to absorb knights from a fallen country who had strong loyalty. The loyalty harbored by knights of a fallen country could later turn into poison.

But it would be a waste to behead all the knights. Since it took enormous funds and time to raise a single knight, it was clear that they would salvage whatever knights they could from the fallen country and make them Gania’s knights.

Floyd found it remarkable how quickly Roxiana grasped this reality, and judged that if she could accept reality so calmly, it would be okay to tell her the truth.

“The reason Lucas was able to enter Kanta with his troops was because of that rift. Lucas entered the capital of Kanta with numerous knights and soldiers under the pretext of helping to deal with the monsters flowing out from the rift.”

“…”

“But you know what? According to our investigation, it seems that rift only appeared about two months ago.”

Roxiana’s eyes widened, then narrowed. She held her breath for a while before speaking.

“There must be a dark mage in Gania. They moved the monsters. Yes, that’s why… That’s why Father accepted Lucas and his troops without any suspicion. And those swords that were supposed to exterminate monsters were turned against my family…”

With just a few words, Roxiana had grasped the exact truth. Floyd was inwardly impressed, but Roxiana had forgotten even the fact that he was beside her as she sank into thought.

‘Monsters…’

She could picture her father, flustered by the sudden appearance of the rift, hurrying to ask the Empire for help. Her father would have welcomed Lucas with open arms when he appeared leading knights, offering to help.

If Lucas had been someone else, he wouldn’t have trusted him that much. But Lucas was Roxiana’s fiancé. He had been for a very long time.

Neither her father nor her mother, nor any of her siblings, doubted Lucas, who was soon to become family.

In that trust, Lucas and his knights drew their swords.

‘It wouldn’t have been a fight. It would have been a one-sided massacre.’

She could vividly imagine her family members dying at the hands of those they trusted, unable to do anything.

‘What role did you play there, Elise?’

While the crown prince Ekion and his family, and the youngest Ranian stayed in the palace, the second son Ian and the third son Naufrid had left the palace long ago. The reason they could all be killed at once was because they were all gathered in the palace.

‘You must have called my family together.’